Aude Somniare
by Novoux
Summary: Shizuo can never control his temper when it matters most. Hence drinking in a bar and trying to forget that maybe it's his fault he's jealous. Shizaya, for Somniare28, or SomniareSolus.


The day he wakes up and starts to realize every yesterday is the same as tomorrow isn't a day. It's the days in a row of waking up the same in the same room, same bed, same empty sunrise of counting down the days into the new year. It starts to creep up on him as he begins to realize how unaware he is of what exactly _it _is and then only brush it off as a lack of sleep or just frustrated more than usual. Being a monster, Shizuo knows with the sort of numbing realization that isn't understood by anyone but himself, is a life sentence that lasts into death when if people remember they remember the strength and not the person. When he finally becomes an adult and goes from job to job it doesn't bother him as much as it did in high school. A kind of empty strength in emotional numbness that doesn't interpret and translate into the nights of never sleeping enough and not waking up until it's time for school or apologizing to Kasuka for losing his temper again. Shizuo never means to do any of it on the day every day becomes the same.

So he finds himself in a bar today and it's quiet when he first comes in, sliding into a seat at the counter where he tries not to remember the last job of being a bartender ending in throwing tables and nearly ripping the place into pieces board by board until it wobbles with the threat of collapsing. All because of one face, one name, and too many occasions. "What can I do for you?" the barkeep asks smoothly, leaning on the counter with an elbow and looks too young to serve with dark black hair and a charming smile that's only skin deep. Of course Shizuo knows these kinds of things when it's not even that late in the evening on an empty stomach and too bitter to listen to anything but his thoughts.

"Something strong." Shizuo murmurs into his hand, leaning on an elbow with his chin collected in his palm and fingers playing over his cheek. Nails dig into the skin and leave indents while he watches blindly as the bartender nods, pulling out bottles that he doesn't bother to recognize and zones out while he thinks. Nothing comes to mind except random fleeting thoughts of should nots and the whys of how things go wrong so quickly. Moments lost in fits of anger that surges and chokes in a hold of not letting go until it explodes and by then it's too late. Counting the mistakes and the fallacies of his own logic when he isn't as stupid as people think a brutish monster is—his own nickname for himself in moments of bitterness. Just anger and frustration that pulls hair and tugs a little too deep at heart strings and confusing emotions. Anger is the one he unsurprisingly knows best in the days like this.

Only today is different because of many certain reasons like two nights before too many arguments and two hours in the game is over when it never is a game in his eyes as the way he sees it. If only he could have seen—"Something wrong?" Interrupted by the bartender Shizuo averts his eyes from the drink placed in front of him into the dark eyes of a face that isn't too familiar—having no idea who he is anyway—but still chalking up to painful reminders of why he can't be human enough to behave himself and act like he isn't different because of too much strength mixed with too much anger. Ugly and unattractive is all he can see himself as now.

Instead of answering like (_a normal fucking human being) _he pretends to be alright ninety-nine percent of the time Shizuo can't help but shake his head in the silence of buzzing before the rush of a bar comes in despite a Monday night and tomorrow will be another sick day if he doesn't feel well enough to slink out of his home as if he hasn't done anything wrong—which is a lie, again—and today is only because there isn't anything to drink at home. Just to relax and unwind the nerves of biting his tongue, empty phone calls to voice mail even if at this point the number has been changed when _the number dialed is not in service or the phone is disconnected. _So he hears the sigh and the pop of shuffling lips and a twisting expression of either acknowledgment of a long night ahead or dealing with another drunk. What Shizuo used to deal with at an old job and he knows the feeling all too well and maybe the heavy drink in front of him is an insult and he should just leave to forget making someone else angry for a change.

"So there is something up." Surprisingly the bartender keeps going, eyes darting to check for more customers but relaxed in the set of his shoulders and the gentle encouraging smile on his face Shizuo makes the effort not to glance at because it reminds him of too much and too little of something else. "What's got you? You don't look like a man out for a night of relaxing, but a night of forgetting that you're drinking alone." A small chuckle that sounds forced and Shizuo doesn't understand why this man—looking younger than he is, which isn't much because he's only twenty-four on the verge of twenty-five and this one looks like he could be his kouhai—is attempting conversation and the more likely it is that he's bored is enough to leave a sour taste in his mouth. Serves him right.

"Ah, if it makes any sense. You just seem...uneasy, I'd say. But if you don't want to talk, that's alright. Tonight's a quiet night anyway." He's far too friendly, leaving Shizuo to narrow his eyes in the direction of empty space and blurring lights despite his hand never grabbing the drink that would serve to burn his throat and leave his head buzzing until he sobers up quickly enough. Strongest man in Ikebukuro and can't stay drunk without enough to kill another man barely of half his strength.

Silence starts to settle in like an old acquaintance between them and the bartender moves away, serving another customer at the other side of the bar hidden by the stand in the middle of the island where all the liquor is held. Shizuo takes the moment to glance up, counting the different types of alcohol and the different kinds of drinks he remembers in the feel of his fingers with each different bottle and the names, silly or serious, crossing his mind with each drink served to one customer or another. At one point they became all blurry when _one _came into the bar and ordered anger stabbed with a Bloody Mary and an olive of a fish eye to make him cringe. And then the chase begins with throwing glass bottles over angry shouts and fearful flinching or escaping the bar while the other customers quickly got out of the way of an angry Shizuo when they realize that lifting a counter is _not _normal.

Then the memory with lines of raging anger and the quickening pulse in his fingertips is broken apart like a broken track when the bartender comes back and picks up a glass to clean. "Don't mind me talking on and on. I'll just try to guess what's eating at you and using your bones as toothpicks. In other words, you look like you've been hit by a semi-truck." he laughs at the small joke to himself, quietly chuckling as means of lightning the dour mood afflicting Shizuo overhead with a flurry of rainstorm and downpour in a summer storm. "And I'm guessing you're too down to explain." Shizuo lifts his head, questioning the meaning of why a bartender cares when he as a bartender only listened to complaints customers voiced and tried not to get too involved lest he wanted to experience anger at their stupidity or the stupid ones that drove them to his bar. Sometimes it's everything in between and unfamiliar as to how to offer advice, so he remembers nodding his head while they spew more and serves them while they continue to pay. It's the best he could offer, so the man in front of him shouldn't even bother if he's unwilling to talk and even more resistant to selling himself out over a drink.

The bartender frowns from the corner of Shizuo's eye while he gazes at the wall below the television hanging in the corner. Probably because of the untouched drink and Shizuo's hands are nowhere near it. But instead of saying something about it he keeps going. "Money troubles? Family issues?" Then he shakes his head to himself, setting the cleaned glass beneath the counter and moving to the next wet one pulled from the sink not too far away. "No, you don't look like either. I'd bet my money on a jilted lover." One look of a withering expression makes him smile in a way that's somewhat uneasy and still headstrong enough to venture further when Shizuo frowns and sets back to staring, save for this time into the clear brown liquid on the rocks of whatever concoction it is and starting to recall that he doesn't even like hard liquor. Sweet things, as childish as it sounds, are his favorite.

Someone else—no, don't start now on this _again—_prefers bitter things in his stead. "So, the girl cheated on you? You look heartbroken past where a drink will help you." And there this punk goes, hitting the nail on the head and waiting for a confession of a lesser man to the gates of some heaven that doesn't have golden gates for monsters. To which Shizuo fixes him with a nasty stare to back off as a warning of curling anger beneath his fingertips but isn't all there even if he tries. The bartender chuckles to himself, raising hands in surrender. "Not trying to offend you. You want me to stop? Tell me then." Shizuo snorts quietly and somehow the younger manages to hear, lips twitching in a smile while Shizuo turns away again and ignores the drink in front of him.

"Besides," a sudden hand grabs the untouched drink and Shizuo opens his mouth to protest when it really doesn't matter anyway and he watches the drink poured down the sink to the barkeep's left. "Staring at a drink you don't like isn't worth nursing a broken heart over. And when you've got the look of still loving her, so maybe it isn't cheating." No one is coming in the bar on a Monday night and the other patrons mind their own business as aging businessmen talking over long days at work and watching sports. Shizuo has never seen the appeal of wasting time in a bar until now.

Suddenly the bartender turns away, as if summoned and probably is while Shizuo now realizes that since he doesn't have a drink he doesn't have to pay unless if the bartender wants to push it with playing therapist. It's none of his damn business and yet this kid keeps talking when the memories of arguments and too many broken things thrown. Angry eyes and this kid is all smiles and bubbly when he's still too young to understand anything.

Or maybe Shizuo is too stupid to understand how to be a human being without breaking everything.

The bartender reappears by the time Shizuo is submerged in the negative thoughts. So he doesn't watch those hands move and pour a margarita of strange vibrant colors of red, white, and orange before it slides to a stop under his nose. When he looks up, eyes are on him, watching with a strange expression and it's just too similar to what he's trying to forget. "From a stranger. Said they knew you had a sweet tooth." Confused, Shizuo racks his brain for the right words while the bartender moves back to cleaning glasses again.

"Who?" is the most eloquent thing to come out of his mouth and maybe it's progress or a lack of trying. Giving up, in other words. But it gets the bartender's attention despite never looking up from his work of cleaning the stains out of glasses washed by hand.

"Another patron. Asked me not to say, but I have my doubts." Shizuo can practically see the smile under the smirk of a bowed head and rolls his eyes.

"Keep it to yourself then." Experimentally he takes a sip of the frozen margarita when some rationality remaining in him is telling him no. Then when the salty lip of the glass meets his tongue it's disgusting and he feels the strong urge to spit it out until icy cold and the fruity sweetness of strawberry and other fruits hit his tongue. Trying not to choke on the sip and the cold that freezes his spine on the way down he coughs, setting the drink down and feeling the tingling of alcohol at the back of his throat buzzing pleasantly. It must be strong enough for it to sting like it does—the flavor does for all the wrong reasons—and maybe it's much better than the brown concoction that smelled sour. This one is sweet and tangy and like liquid gold on his tongue because even for his arguably childish tastes and the worst part is—it makes his eyes burn not from the bite of alcohol.

"You alright?" young eyes asks and Shizuo doesn't want to be reminded of exactly what he has done. And this drink (is so sinfully there like an early Christmas gift) is the result of childish tastes and regret sticking in his throat. Blackberry, raspberry, strawberry, and lime mixed into a drink and it tastes like lips that purse when they take a sip and bitter on the inside of a hot tongue. The bitterness afterward when he pulls away and there is not set of bruising lips and sweet triple berry margarita left to lick off and kiss off of skin in one night of living dangerously.

All Shizuo can do is shake his head slowly, still in disbelief while the innocent drink completed with a pink parasol resting on the side and fallen onto the counter top he wonders if this is a cruel joke. The bartender glances up at him curiously, studying the sullen features and questioning in his mind the relationship of his other patron to this one dressed for his job. "Bad memories then? Sorry about that." he shakes his head when Shizuo doesn't answer, still thinking of the possible scenarios. "...Does it remind you of her?"

Fingers dig into the wood of the counter with an audible hiss of wood scratching and he takes this as a warning and as a yes in which the topic may still hurt too much to share. Unsure if overstepping the boundary the barkeep quietens for several moments, studying Shizuo out of the corner of his eye while carefully putting clean glasses away. Just as he's thinking of something to say and try to crack the code to the upset patron, he hears the same low voice speak up. "...it's a he." And—

Oh. That broken expression of utter guilt and when he sees the expression on different people he hasn't seen one as deeply disturbed as this. In fascination and sympathy the bartender thinks of what to say next while Shizuo takes another drink, this time longer and more close to a mouthful than a sip and his lips twist in a grimace. Across the island and blocking Shizuo's view is the only expression the bartender has seen that hides the same emotion, pondering if they're related to a certain situation. Wheels turning, he thinks aloud. "My mistake then. He...didn't leave you then, did he. He didn't cheat on you at all. You two had an argument, am I close?" Playing with fire and he's sure to get burned but in the bar tending business one has to be a therapist, friend, parent, and drink server all at once and while Shizuo knows this he numbly tries to ignore the bartender again, watching the slush of a frozen margarita with red and white swirls up to the blood orange slice on the side.

"I fought with him." The stinging _again _doesn't make its way into his mouth dry and numbed with alcohol and whoever gave him this drink knows that he needs enough to start speaking. He's not going to care and if it matters in the future of how angry he is at himself then validating how stupid he is with someone else is only insult to injury. "And I hurt him. So stop interrogating me with all the questions." Questions, questions. All burning into his lips and none quite as empty as the feeling of empty palms around a cold drink on a Monday night. An empty bed and an empty heart just as much of an empty head with shouting and accusations when they were never _anything _in the first place. Just simple words of a confession torn and wrapped around some form of gift giving that's violently gruesome in the fact that he held the most fragile thing and still ripped it apart.

Called him a liar. Slut. Whore. Cheater. Using him when it's clearly the other way around by the throws of angry fists and fingers clenching tight. And back to him come the insulting declarations of hate and that no, he doesn't belong to anyone and what they've been doing isn't to pass the time but to alleviate boredom and use each other. The best and worst part of it is that they're not even _dating. _Just kissing because if Shizuo tried to move past that, he'd lose him. And now he loses that game and this one of dancing around the subject far too much and not knowing that he's taken by someone else.

"My boyfriend's a therapist." If that's what he's asking—Shizuo looks up from the table. "And you look like you need a drink or three. And someone to rant to, because if you keep it in, you'll only let it out when you don't want to." The bartender speaks like a sage and mixes another triple berry, refilling Shizuo's nearly empty glass and replacing the parasol with a red one that has the same color of stop signs and traffic lights signifying danger and the wrong direction. Story of his life. "You look like you've been in the business. You know how it goes, then. Tell me what's bothering you—"

Fine. "And you give advice. I used to be a bartender, kid." Shizuo huffs, twirling the parasol in his fingers and wholly unamused as the bartender looks serious with those dark eyes of his. At least—gritting his teeth because this isn't the time nor the place—his eyes aren't red. Another couple swallows and an icy chill down his back and hates the smile on the stupid kid's face when it doesn't have a right to be there which he knows isn't mocking but _pity _disgusts him like Celty's expression and careful words. Tiptoe around the subject like a bomb about to go off and in reality it already has so there isn't a point and Shizuo knows he deserves this. "Don't see why I should bother with a brat like you." Especially if he wants to play the therapist. The barkeeper smiles gently, holding up a hand as to ask for a moment and then turns to a call, leaving Shizuo to wonder what he thinks he's doing moping to someone else in a bar.

"Do what you want. I'm not forcing you for my own benefit." The barkeep moves back to drying glasses minutes later, gripping them in practiced expertise and Shizuo starts to wonder how long this kid has been in the business. "I'm doing this because you look like your heart has been crushed and you're blaming yourself. Whatever it is, it's not your entirely your fault so stop blaming yourself. You're only digging the self-pity deeper." Shizuo's fingers clench at the cheeky seriousness that grates his nerves and can only think of angry red eyes when his temper flares so—hush. As much as he wants to get angry, it's not going to help.

"Fine. You want to help? Do what you want." His own words back at the brat Shizuo swallows more ice to numb the ache beneath his fingers and settling in his chest. "I fucked up. Didn't realize he was dating someone else and I got angry. We were..." How to describe not quite friends and not enemies? Kissing, chasing, going on dates, where does the line draw itself? Shizuo shakes his head and rests it back in his palm. "I don't know. Not even fuck buddies because he never wanted to fuck. We hung out and sometimes we'd just spend time together. Like normal fucking people except normal people don't cheat on others." The anger narrows his eyes at the berry drink and he can't help but want to tear everything apart. Remembering the numerous insults and jagged words like nothing is alright and confessions don't exist in either's vocabulary. Silent afternoons didn't either.

"That sounds like dating. But why do you say he was dating someone else?" The bartender eyes Shizuo's drink, watching the steady pace of the red and white with a streak of orange disappear slowly and the miserable expression on the blond's face doesn't lessen at all. Instead it crinkles like the fragments of a mask. "And not everyone has the reason of cheating for why they don't have sex." The benefit of the doubt as if the smarmy bastard knows something and Shizuo punctuates his glare, already not liking this but if he's this far then there's no point in backing out.

"Because I caught him hanging around someone else." Another drink and the chill doesn't bother him anymore. Neither does the alcohol when its purpose isn't functioning any longer and the pleasant buzz is only a bad aftertaste like blood in the mouth of someone else. With bright red eyes darkening in anger and refusing to lose his calm when Shizuo is the beast allowed to be a beast. Stamp his feet and scream all he likes, and those red eyes and slender fingers never rise above self-preservation.

It isn't fair.

It doesn't matter whether or not Izaya is or was dating Kadota. Or that he lets his own jealousy ruin his own and someone else's happiness. Whatever it's supposed to be when he can't get red eyes and cold lips out of his head and scrubbing his skin raw only to never forget the imprints.

Just keep telling himself that while the bartender thinks to himself, not accepting that answer. "Was he explicitly cheating on you? Being committed to you by dating is still being in a relationship. So to cheat on you isn't fair to you at all." And what happens to not being official? Does that even matter or does this kid just romanticize everything because his boyfriend's a therapist and so what does it matter what the issue is? Because this is Izaya they're talking about and this is all so wrong on enough levels to make Shizuo's head spin without the alcohol and cheap music.

Wracking his brain, Shizuo can't find an instance of exactly cheating. Not explicitly holding hands, kissing, or having sex. Just hanging around him for far too long when Izaya is the one who says he's busy. They're not even in a relationship and if it is it's the strangest one he's ever heard of for sometimes hanging out and other times trying to kill each other. "But the real question is whether or not you want to be with him." Shizuo is drinking another brain-freezing mouthful of icy cold alcohol when the bartender speaks again, choking on it and roughly swallowing the rest with a frosty glare directed at the innocent expression on the kid's face.

"What does it matter? We weren't dating. It was whatever the fuck it was when I wasn't thinking." Shizuo chews on his bottom lip when the numbing burn of alcohol loosens the dry hitch of his tongue. If blood starts to spill over his tongue and sting like burnt copper then he doesn't care so long as he can glare at the counter top. Clearly the bartender isn't impressed but with little option and realizing what he has done there isn't anything to discuss. Not like it's getting through the kid's head so quickly when he knows nothing at all. And like hell he's going to get any chance now—fucking everything up without being in a relationship at all.

The bartender leans on his elbows, dark eyes on Shizuo and burning into a guilty conscience. "You love him, so why not?" Shizuo looks up, startled almost and narrowing in silent accusations and crushing anger starts to tense the muscles in his hands to throw and crush something until it drains. "All you're doing by blaming yourself for a mistake is reassuring yourself that you can't love him. Based on what you've told me, you know you've made a mistake. You know you let your jealousy get ahold of you when you want him, so it's only natural you were angry seeing him with someone else." And suddenly the drink in front of Shizuo isn't worth staring into and he numbly pushes it away while gripping his hands until his knuckles start to tear and bruise. This isn't—how is some _kid _supposed to dictate his choices for him?

Hearing a call for him from the other side of the counter top, the bartender glances at him one last time and gives a soft smile. "If you love him, apologize. Explain yourself, but don't let your chance slip away again." Then he turns, moving to fill an order around the island and leaving Shizuo to glance at the drink pushed away from him and clutch his hair tightly in his fingers with his temple on his palm. So far this night has only been more confusing than drinking alone and waking up with a hangover, but for some reason a bartender decides to humor him this time and actually validate a monster like him can _love _(which is _not_ possible) the flea when they've been in a strange relationship limbo of hate and almost getting along to being able to not kill each other in the same room. Which makes the guilt of getting angry and jealous when he sees Izaya hanging off of Kadota's arm and throwing a vending machine or twelve all the more worse to recall. Hence the drinking until he forgets—he doesn't even deserve to have someone listen to him.

"You're still not going to let it go, are you?" Interrupting Shizuo's typical monologue of self-depreciation the younger man comes back, glancing at the abandoned drink and then to Shizuo while moving to wash glasses that are in his hands. "Nothing is going to get better, whether you want it to or not, if you keep making this your fault. Get over the fear and tell him. Tell him what you feel when the worst that can happen is being rejected. Whatever happens depends on what _you _decide to do." Like it's so fucking easy and while the anger sizzles beneath Shizuo's skin he has to grudgingly admit in the very back corner of his mind that the kid has a point. Moping doesn't ever fix anything, but it does drown his mind in the same guilt that plagues him anyway. And losing Izaya—whatever the fuck they've been doing Shizuo has no idea but those lips and those fingers are strangely missing and maybe the flea would care—no. Izaya doesn't care.

The bartender shakes his head, taking Shizuo's drink and dumping it in the sink while replacing the spot with a neatly folded napkin. "Luckily you don't have to make the decision. It's been made for you." With a Cheshire grin hiding in the folds of a slight smirk mixing in an encouraging smile he turns back to washing dishes, leaving Shizuo to raise an eyebrow while grabbing the folded napkin and pulling it open.

_Jealousy is an ugly thing, Shizu-chan._

Ink stains on a white napkin and a crudely drawn smiley face next to the letters Shizuo feels his heart stop and catch in his throat, looking up at the bartender in wide-eyed confusion half-masked in annoyance. The bartender glances toward the door, where one patron covered in a coat with a strange trim of fur at the ends below the knees heads toward. And maybe this is one last chance and not quite drunk but definitely still angry he's torn between wanting to throw the entire counter at what he thinks may be the fucking flea and a million thoughts are racing through his head all at once. Like if Izaya is actually here and was _listening to the entire conversation _on the other side of the bar counter to which there's only one way to find out and the bartender—bratty kid he is, cheeky and cocky at the same time and still looks to young to serve—hands him a smile and a nod. _Go, _he says, and maybe Shizuo's anger starts to turn to lead in his feet when he's getting some strange second chance and this isn't like Izaya to do anything like this. Or for him to gut himself at a bar and have his guilt on display.

On the back of the napkin, Shizuo comes to notice in a corner, is the name of the drink. _Aude Somnio._

But there's only one chance and he's slipping out the door with a smile hiding in the shadows. Shizuo can smell the reek of a flea miles away and this isn't any different when his mind starts to sober up quickly and the imprints of fingers on his shoulders and lips down his throat can only mean one thing.

And catching a pale wrist encased in fur out when there's snow on the ground reflecting the orange-yellow of streetlights is just the beginning of a chase that's sure to come—that is, until lips press against his and taste like the same margarita Shizuo was sipping earlier and the added extra of saltwater when Shizuo reminds himself that he's messed up and he's an idiot. This has to be a dream—if he dares because there's no way he caught the fucking flea and just exposed himself in a bar and whether or not Izaya planned this entire thing is more likely than not when he tastes the same berry flavor on another tongue and red eyes around the rims to fingers tightening on his arms with bare skin on Shizuo's coat.

The strangest thing is that Izaya hates sweets and Shizuo and losing. What a coincidence that he seems to cause himself all of them for no logical reason at all.

"_Aude somniare, _Shizu-chan." His breath puffs with a twisting smirk to hide the frown before he leans in again and brushes cold lips against cracking ones with burnt copper because maybe they've both missed this.

Under the buzzing influence of alcohol Izaya could be imagining the _I'm sorry _that comes with.

* * *

><p><em>Last round of author bingo goes to SomniareSolus! Thank you for the last round of bingo; I tried to make this sweet after all the angst I continually write. Originally this was meant to be very angsty, but I decided that it wouldn't be fair to you. I hope you enjoy and that this doesn't sound too ridiculous, but thank you for reading and a pleasure to meet you.<em>

_Notice a spelling mistake? Please let me know. Also, one last thank you to every author who unknowingly participated in author bingo. Next game will be next year, so thank you all for the fun chance of writing and giving these as surprise gifts._

_Thank you for reading._


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